German Iyer releases his autobiography

Mr T.H.Iyer, a walking friend  whom I have known only for the  last four years but feels like I have known him all my life. A popular man in our walking group he is a role model  as a person who is fit as a fiddle even at 90.

In some context I had an opportunity to read Mama`s  Curriculam vitae and I was impressed with his achievements as a professional, as a social worker and for his deep involvement with many  spiritual gurus. Besides he is a multitalented man who is a  poet, writer, motivational speaker and much more.  A widely travelled man linguist Mr Iyer  spent 35 years in  Germany. I Understand it was Maha Periava of Kanchi who named him German Iyer.

Though Mr Iyer had published three books earlier ( two of them in German) he had not published his  memoirs. I planted the idea in his mind and started pushing him into action as I have been doing with many senior citizens I come across. I am glad Mr Iyer took up the challenge and his dream of publishing his autobiography has become a reality. A surprise addition in the book is a collection of Mr.Iyer`s compositions in Tamil in praise of  Lord Krishna

Mr Mama  always used to say that there are many similarities in our lives. Apart from many other things I noticed two interesting similarities from our childhood, Mama had an accident  as a young boy requiring stitches on the forehead, the mark of which is still visible and is used as an identification mark in his passport. I too had a similar accident when  I was six and use the scar as an identification mark in my passport. Another similarity is mama being dressed as a girl when he was a little boy as his mother wanted a  girl as her second child.  I too was dressed up like a girl with my long hair tied into a bun adorned with mallippoo. My parents too wanted their second child to be a girl- and it did happen. My sister Prema was born four years after I was born.

Mama`s autobiography is the sixth book published in the last eight months influenced by me and 15^th in the last  three years.  Many more are in the pipeline and I hope to achieve a target of 25 before end of next year.

I congratulate Mama for writing the book which is  not only  an interesting record  of the story of his life story for posterity but also contains valuable gems of wisdom gained over the years which the youngsters will find useful. The book printed by the talented team of Compuprint is for private circulation only.

The book was released at a small function at Gandhi Nagar Club, Chennai by  Mr R.Natarajan,  Commissioner of Police ( Retd.). The first two copies were received by Mr T.R.Gopalan and me in the presence of the author and his son Mani.

I pray god to bestow good health on mama so that he can continue to inspire his younger friends